Senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and two-time former Punjab Chief Minister, Captain Amarinder Singh on Saturday has denied reports of a recent meeting with Congress Parliamentary Party Chairperson Sonia Gandhi and termed it as “baseless rumours.” Singh said that the claims that are in circulation on social media are “baseless” and without an “iota of truth”. The former Punjab Chief Minister asserted that he was “committed to the Bharatiya Janata Party, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, and Party President JP Nadda.”
The 81-year-old leader asserted he has made up his mind once and for all and he will always remain committed to the BJP. Singh, a two-time former Chief Minister of the Congress, is also the scion of the erstwhile Patiala royal family. “I have made up my mind forever and will always remain committed to the BJP. At such a stage, you don’t look back”, he said in a statement released by his office, adding that “it is the principle of my life that a decision once taken can never be taken back.”
Captain Amarinder Singh left the Congress party a year ago and formed his own party, the Punjab Lok Congress (PLC), which later merged with the BJP in Punjab. Singh launched PLC in 2021 after long unresolved disputes with the state Congress unit. His party contested the 2022 Punjab Legislative Assembly elections but did not make much of an impression, failing to secure a single seat in the state Assembly. Meanwhile, in Punjab, there has been tension within the state Congress unit after the formation of the I.N.D.I.A alliance with the Aam Adami Party (AAP) as a member of the bloc. The Opposition parties under the alliance are working towards contesting the upcoming Lok Sabha elections jointly with the AAP to take on the ruling BJP at the Centre. However, some leaders of the Punjab Congress are weary of cooperation with the AAP in the state. Earlier this week, the Leader of the Opposition in the Punjab Assembly, Pratap Singh Bajwa, said on X (formerly Twitter) that the state’s leaders were not willing to ally with AAP in the 2024 Lok Sabha Elections.
Punjab Congress ‘in talks’ with former ministers
CHANDIGARH: Ahead of the 2024 parliamentary elections, Congress leadership in Punjab is reportedly ‘in talks ‘with some of its former leaders who joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) last year, to make a case for their homecoming. Besides former PPCC chief Sunil Jakhar—who is now the BJP’s Punjab state president—seven former ministers in the previous Congress government joined the BJP. Officially, the party leadership is tight-lipped about its strategy to rope in these senior leaders. There are reports that at least three former ministers in the previous Amarinder Singh-led Congress government may re-join the parent party ahead of the coming General Election, said sources privy to the latest developments. The seven former ministers include Manpreet Badal, Gurpreet Singh Kangar, Raj Kumar Verka, Sunder Sham Arora, Balbir Singh Sidhu and Rana Gurmeet Sodhi. In the coming days, the Congress leadership is said to be planning the announcement of “certain joinings”. Meanwhile, PPCC chief Amarinder Raja Warring confirmed that some AAP MLAs and other leaders were keen to join the Congress as they were feeling “suffocated there”.
